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<title>The Theatre of Memory</title>
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<o:Author>Kate Robinson</o:Author>
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<o:Created>2001-04-02T22:56:00Z</o:Created>
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<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center'><b><span
style='font-family:Arial'>The Theatre of Memory<o:p></o:p></span></b></p>
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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify'><span style='font-family:Arial'>The
original Theatre of Memory was designed in Italy during the Renaissance by a
man called Giulio Camillo. It was an encyclopaedic memory aid consisting of
hundreds of images which were arranged on the tiers of an amphitheatre. The
images were meant to ignite the imagination, and thereby to<span
style="mso-spacerun: yes">� </span>stimulate the memory, of<span
style="mso-spacerun: yes">� </span>the solitary spectator of the Theatre,
enabling him or her to remember significant, esoteric knowledge. It represented
a unified referential system, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes">�</span>alluding
to Hermetic, Judaic,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">� </span>Hellenic and Christian
motifs. An eschatological catalogue, the Theatre of Memory was remarkable in
its marriage of symbol with three dimensional space. And all the more
remarkable because, although the idea of the Theatre was known throughout
Europe, we cannot be certain that it was<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">�
</span>actually built.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">� </span>A piece of Renaissance
conceptual art?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify'><span style='font-family:Arial'>The
work in the exhibition is inspired by descriptions of images from Camillo�s
Theatre. <i>Juno and Apollo in the Clouds, Apollo and the Muses, After Endymion
</i>and the <i>Saturn</i> series are all drawn directly from mythical allusions
made in the Theatre. Often, in the Theatre, particular motifs will crop up
again and again, their meaning subtly modified by their position within the
schema. One such motif is Juno, and I have represented her here as <i>Juno on a
Swing, </i>to convey the idea of levity and abandon with which, at times, she
is associated.</span><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify'><span style='font-family:Arial'>In
researching current theories of the locality of memory within the body, I
worked at the Human Anatomy Department at Glasgow University. I made ink on
paper drawings and sculptures modelled from the human brain and heart. For the
drawings I studied microscopic images of sections of the brain - <i>lower, mid </i>and
<i>upper pons</i>, and the <i>hippocampus,</i> for example. I used the
conventions of the laboratory to make decisions about what sections of the body
I would study and I was faithful to what I saw under the microscope. I made no
attempt at objectivity. I could have measured the work, made grids on the
paper, projected the slides and copied their images. I wanted to make a
subjective map of what I saw - and I think the results are beautiful. It was
the most intimate life drawing I have ever done.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify'><span style='font-family:Arial'>During
my experience at the Human Anatomy Department, I began to wonder whether the
real Theatre of Memory is not the body itself, and this lead me to study other
hermetic image systems which use the "corpus" as its theatre. I am
grateful to the Special Collections Department at Glasgow University Library
for digitising some images from the English philosopher Robert Fludd's <i>Utriusque
Cosmi</i> for me. These images showing a cosmic creation story also look like
the iris and pupil of an eye contracting and expanding. I know Fludd and
Camillo would probably never have met, but there is such a spare and complex
simplicity to Fludd's drawings in comparison to the dramatic flourishes of
Camillo's ideas, that he makes a perfect foil. I also hope that this will help
to place the work, to root the hermeticism of the genre in Britain as well as
Italy. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class=MsoNormal><span style='font-family:Arial'>Fludd�s drawings, beginning
with <i>Et sic in infinitum (And so, forever), </i>form the visual introduction
to a computer generated model comprising of the images that Camillo described
in his Theatre.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes">� </span>The virtual Theatre of
Memory, like a giant eye floating in space, is the source for<span
style="mso-spacerun: yes">� </span>the rest of the sculptures in the
exhibition, all of which, in one way or another, are concerned with the body.</span><o:p></o:p></p>
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